


Learning to (Not) Fly

by fairytalehearts



Category: Arrow (TV 2012), Supergirl (TV 2015), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Gen, Maybe Kara has a crush on Barry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-03
Updated: 2015-06-03
Packaged: 2018-04-02 15:41:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4065430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fairytalehearts/pseuds/fairytalehearts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Triple Crossover. Kara meets Team Arrow and Team Flash. I hate tagging all of the characters but all the usual suspects are in this one. With a cameo from Cupid. ***ALLUDES TO THINGS IN THE SUPERGIRL PILOT**</p>
            </blockquote>





	Learning to (Not) Fly

**Author's Note:**

> I tried to think of a reason Kara would go to Starling and this was all I came up with- a jumbled hot mess.

“You like flying, right?”

Cat’s voice interrupts her staring at the sky and she turns around in her chair to look at her boss who was suddenly inside her bubble. So much for superpowers.

“Um. Yes- well, yeah I like flying.” Kara stuttered seriously hoping her boss didn’t catch on to the fact that she was sneaking out to the roof several times a day.

“Good. You’re on the next flight to Starling City. Literally everyone one on staff is chasing down leads on Supergirl and I need you to do a fiver on that new girl running Queen Consolidated or Palmer Tech or whatever that Queen person renamed it to now.”

Kara didn’t understand what was happening, “Fiver as in five paragraphs?”

“Pages. You’ll be there for five days, shadowing, watching, writing, watching. I’ll send Jimmy to do the photos in a few days- now off you go. I had to cash in serious favors in Starling for this, and if Lois Lane scoops you, I will personally have your head put on display in the lobby.”

Cat did a dramatic turn on her heel and headed back to her office.

She must be really desperate- but Kara would take that one as a win. Except what was she going to wear to Starling? The tickets get emailed to her and the plane literally leaves in two hours. Running down to the lobby she headed home and hoped she could remember where her suitcase was.

**

Googling Felicity Smoak did not go well.

For instance, there were two very blurry paparazzi pictures of her and Oliver Queen at a bed and breakfast in Gotham. It was fuzzy face and blonde hair, the photogs clearly more focused on Oliver than Felicity. The only other things that came up was her senior project at MIT and brief mentions of her in Starling City Crime reports.

There was a litany of things about Oliver- including speculation that he was the Arrow. And some very scandalous pictures of him half-naked-

Which she was not looking at on her way up to Felicity’s office. Nope.

“Kara Danvers from National Magazine- I have a 1:30 with Ms. Smoak.” The man at the desk look at her credentials and then back at her before showing her to the elevator, which included a retina scan, a password and a fingerprint scan.

“She might be finishing up lunch, but I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

The elevator does not go to the top floor of the building (where the CEO's office normally was), but stops on floor 12. There were no buttons in the elevator but Kara had gotten good at guesstimating how high up she was. The car sat for a minute, while making a low humming noise before the doors opened- and an arrow hit her chest before clattering to the ground.

“Haha! I was right! Fifteen minutes!” Felicity pumped her fist, before putting the bow down, “I am so sorry about that by the way. And betting alone time with your boyfriend doesn’t really justify shooting someone. And we officially have the second worst meeting I’ve ever had. Which will restart in 3, 2, 1. Hi, I’m Felicity Smoak. And you’re Supergirl.”

Kara couldn’t even deny it because Oliver Queen, is apparently her head of security and has a satellite image of her flying over National City. Felicity apparently had drones everywhere too- near her house. Metropolis-

“What do you want?” She asks quietly, trying to shake off the shock.

“You need- help. And we- need contacts. I figured giving Cat an exclusive would get you into town. So we can talk. Then you’ll go to Central City. Whoever is running your tech is good but if my AI can find his IP address in less than .2 milliseconds then the NCPD will be onto him soon.”

Oliver has nodded in approval before carefully choosing his words, “You lack focus.”

Any doubts about being the Arrow were erased when he shot her again with the bow, this time the arrow nicking the side of her ear as it planted itself into the wall behind her.

Superhero Bootcamp (as the “not really a security guard” Mr. Diggle calls it). Involves physical training, up linking something or other in National City and disarming techniques. Followed by a lesson in police activity given by the Black Canary.

She felt like she was on American Idol, the three of them scribbling down notes and talking amongst themselves while judging her with judgey looks.

Disarming techniques were pretty easy, but Mr. Diggle does not go easy on her. The whole point of disabling someone’s “sidearm” was not to get shot, it was so they could not take hostages or take innocent lives.

“Um, I usually, just bend the gun in half.”

“So what is the DA or the Police going to use to prosecute them? Corrupted evidence? The whole point of stopping crime is to stop crime. Not let them walk two weeks later. Where are they getting their weapons from?”

Kara honestly didn’t know.

“Look, Kara, we don’t have a lot of time here and I don’t want you to think this is personal. You need to think about these things from both sides of the law. As vigilantes, we work around the police. It doesn’t mean we pretend they don’t exist. How do you prioritize cases?” Mr. Diggle asks questions she’s not ready to answer. Using Clark’s example was a cop out (literally). Metropolis PD was always so happy and grateful to have Superman’s help- and if the DEO was any indication she wasn’t going to have such an easy time of it.

If Kara could say “?” she would.

“Say two people need help. Who do you save? Who is closer? Which presents the biggest threat to the city? What about your sister, what if it’s your sister or a plane? What if Clark needs help? What if we need help? What if during all of that there’s a giant meteor crashing towards Earth? What do you do with all of the bad guys? What’s your plan to protect your identity?” Laurel asks reading off her notes.

“These are questions I wish someone would have asked me when I started doing this. I had a support system- sort of- and Oliver really had to make the hard decisions in the beginning. And we’re not perfect but the goal of this- Bootcamp is to make sure all heroes everywhere have resources they can rely on. Friends they can trust-like we have in Central City.”

Laurel leaves to go to her day job, Oliver to bug Felicity, leaving her alone with Mr. Diggle. He pulls a gun on her and while him making sound effects is amusing, she thinks she understands the importance of disarming bad guys with guns.

“Ripping the gun out of their hands might trigger a squeeze. You want to make them drop it, use your- ah-”

“Super speed?”

“-Yeah that. To eject the clip. Kicking the gun away isn’t enough. Carrying zipties for their hands is a good idea. First step: Neutralize Target. Second step: Access civilians. You want to memorize a map of National City and know which hospital will be prepared to take an emergency drop-off. The thing Oliver doesn’t realize is that while he’s going after the perp, someone needs to make sure everyone is okay. You’re the only one on your team, which is both a disadvantage and an advantage.”

Kara nodded in understanding. Diggle motioned towards the elevator, the two of them heading for the parking garage.

“Starling only has one hospital that doesn’t require insurance.” He says when they’re in the car. “And usually the rich have private doctors they’d rather see instead. I know every route to Starling General. I know exactly how long it takes the van to get to a crime scene and how long it takes the police to get there after that.”

Even though Oliver might be the Arrow, she had no illusions to who the real hero was on Team Arrow.

He stops the car outside of her hotel and as she’s leaving she stops to kiss him on the cheek, “You balance him out, you know. All of them really. I’m sorry you guys aren’t getting along right now. Thank you for the ride Mr. Diggle.”

“My friends call me John.” He smiles, motioning for her to go inside.

Giving a small nod, she corrects herself, “John.”

**

 “You can’t just fly away when there’s a human opponent.”

Kara had been in Starling for three days and she wasn’t sure if she made a decision about Oliver Queen yet. From their time together, she had seen him massage Felicity’s feet and coax her to take a nap with him. Yet when they were alone, he was a Class A jerk. He was strict and deadly and apparently was instrumental in taking out someone called “Reverse Flash” whoever that was.

“Yes, I can.”

“Well then the criminal made off with the money, the jewels and secret formula. You need to focus on hand-to-hand combat without breaking- limbs.” Oliver instructed, putting his lead-plated boxing gloves on. He had scrounged up some kryptonite, which sucked, but she only had two more days in Starling before she was going to Central City to talk to the one they called Cisco about her costume.

Her instinct was to fly away, regroup. But Oliver was right. She needed to work on not destroying everything in sight, otherwise she’d need to start learning how to repave roads and car repairs- and that window in the Catco building-

She smashed through the training dummy in frustration.

“You can walk fine and look at me without lazering me to death. You have been controlling your powers since birth, you just need more finesse when fighting. You’re the hero, you’re supposed to be helping people, not causing irreparable damage to the main road out of National City.”

“Break time!”

“Thank god, the sane one is back.” Kara cheered, happily accepting the Big Belly Burger bag. Where her fight training with Oliver was worse than pulling teeth, her computer lessons with Felicity were a joy. She was patient and she actually could give advice about her uplink to NCPD’s servers.

Also she was super smart and nice and cute and maybe let her borrow her clothes and buys her burgers.  She also made Oliver more tolerable. Like a real human being. “If he messes this-” She motions between the two of them, “-up _you_ are welcome in NC anytime.”

“Everybody loves Felicity. See?” Felicity smiled, sitting down in his lap and if she wasn’t forcing a french fry into Oliver’s mouth she might have had a chance.

“Oliver loves Felicity has more panache.” Oliver corrected her grabbing his burger and dutifully holding a napkin for when she needed one. They argue the merits of using the word “panache” in a sentence the entire meal, making googly eyes at each other.

 The air shifts suddenly, and if she were not- well Supergirl, she would not have seen the person running into the room and sit down across from her at Felicity’s desk.

“You’re not Felicity.” He says looking over to the couch.

“You’re really fast.” Kara blurts instead.

“Okay maybe you are Felicity. I’m Barry. The Flash.”

Nodding, Kara took one look at her friends on the couch who obviously wanted to be alone so they could flirt at each other, “Wanna race to LA and back?”

Barry looks at her like she’s kidding. She’s not.

2.5 minutes later when they return, Oliver is doing some very not work-appropriate things to Felicity on the couch and Barry covers her eyes before whisking her to pizza, “Second dinner?”

His hands linger a moment longer than proper, before setting her down on the ground and holding his arm out for her.

She might be in love.

**

“I am so sorry about last night.” Felicity starts babbling even before she’s in human earshot, but Kara nods and averts her eyes walking into the Queen Inc. training room. She would actually need to write her piece of Felicity before leaving for National City. Jimmy- James was waiting in the lobby to take pictures and her (hopefully) five page spread on the new head of the company should be a written by the time she gets to STAR Labs.

Then maybe two paragraphs on her impending Future of STAR Labs piece.

Barry was still there, talking to Oliver about something in hushed tones, the three of them would leave for Central City in the morning.

“James Olson. Nice to meet you.” Jimmy was his charming self as usual, and if it was weird for Felicity to have her first photoshoot with a Pulitzer winning photographer, she wasn’t letting it show.

Mainly because Oliver was making faces at her from the other side of the camera. Three setups and two wardrobe changes later, Jimmy is insisting on going to Felicity’s office to take pictures there.

Oliver obediently led him upstairs, waiting for Felicity to do her final wardrobe change.

 “Was this supposed to be serious? I’m sorry. I’m rarely stern.” Felicity furrowed her eyebrows doing her best Oliver impression before giggling. Her last outfit was an evening gown, and Kara dutifully played the role of assistant, carrying the train behind Felicity towards the elevator.

 “So, uh, about last night.” Barry ran a hand through his hair and smiled, “I had fun.”

“Me too.” Kara smiled back, making sure Felicity’s very expensive dress was not going to get stuck in the elevator. She wasn’t sure where James was going with the dress but his assistant called Felicity’s assistant and set up the wardrobe sometime last week-

“I was hoping we could do it again sometime. Like a date.”

Felicity gasps before punching Barry on the arm.

“I would like that.” Kara finds herself saying. The two of them share a really weird look, which does not go unnoticed by James or Oliver when they reach Felicity’s office. Then again Oliver might be preoccupied with Felicity’s boobs looking awesome in her dress.

“You, Mr. _Never Dances_ are wasting this opportunity-” Felicity motions to the dress before doing a little wiggle and shimmy before spinning around.

He interrupts her with a hard kiss on the mouth, followed by a little twirl and a dip- Jimmy’s camera flashing the whole time. They sway together for a moment before Oliver forces himself to take a step back. Kara can hear his heartbeat speed up, see a flush creep up his neck and while he generally looks pissed off- he is smiling.

“This is about you, not me.” He whispers gently, “And your desk.”

“You, Me and My desk. Got it.” Felicity winks at him before asking Mr. Olson for her close-up. Obediently sitting behind the desk, which while most of her office is pristine her desk is a mess. There are computer parts and sketches and a picture of Oliver and Mr. Diggle at his wedding, accompanied by diploma from MIT which was being used a giant catch all/coaster.

“Are they always like this?” Jimmy stage-whispers, not even bothering to aim the camera. He just clicked the shutter at random angles because Kara is sure the two of them flirting with each other would sell magazines just fine.

“I think so.” Kara smiles.

She supposed it was like animals in their natural habitat, and soon the two of them forgot about them standing there. Kara’s sure Oliver would have kissed her again, if not for Felicity’s assistant coming in at a particularly inopportune time.

James starts putting his equipment away, Kara putting a hand on his arm. “Oliver wants to talk to you about Clark.”

The fake smile he plasters on is almost award-worthy, “Clark is-”

Kara takes a step in front of her friend, “Oliver, please don’t shoot him with an arrow; he’s not bulletproof.”

Kara speeds away back to her hotel, maybe she can get a nap in before Oliver tries to beat her up again.

**

Deciding to be the bigger person, she chooses to believe that Oliver is a good and/or nice person for trying to help her. With a pat on the head, he was kind of a dick, but she sped away to Central City and tried to remember the good things about Oliver.

Like Felicity. And Mr. Diggle. He was oddly Dad-like to her, and she found it to be nice. He was also horrible at emojis, but she’s sure he’d learn with time.

Her experience in Starling was like boot camp. With drill sergeants and maybe a little crying.

When she came to Central City it was like a giant friggin party. There were balloons and fabric swatches and thankfully she’d gotten enough practice with her drill sergeants about sensory overload to completely understand all of Cisco and Caitlin’s questions at the same time.

“I mean aliens! Sorry. Do you prefer ‘not of this earth’ or like straight-up Kryptonian? Also, your cousin Superman won’t take our calls and I mean Oliver threatened to beat him up and stuff but that bow I made him took like 47 hours to make from scratch and it both heat and cold proof to like every measurable scale- but Superman is probably outside of that scale or maybe he could throw it into space so I could test the oxidization outside of the hemisphere-”

“Her physiology is so similar I mean we must have a common ancestor otherwise there’d be tentacles or horns or tails or green skin or something, I know there are other alien races but you’re the only one we’ve had the honor of meeting. Also drink this-”

Kara eyed the shot glass wearily before downing it. It was definitely Vodka. And she was definitely buzzed.

“It’ll last for about ten minutes.” Barry adds helpfully, downing his own shot. “It will also kill most small animals and most human beings under 150 pounds. There’s some sort of delayed absorption agent. _It’s great._ ”

Maybe that was enough liquid courage to kiss the speedster. Maybe it wasn’t. The urge to kiss him left with the alcohol and then she was on a treadmill and then there was more drinking.

She’s actually a bit hungover when she wakes up, sideways in Caitlin’s bed, Barry and Cisco out in the living room. Caitlin is oddly not there, but she assumes they’re in her apartment.

Cisco wakes up with a start yelling, “Science!” before scrambling around the living room looking for his keys, “Barry! Get up! We need to get back to the lab!”

“You coming Kara?”

She regrets it almost instantly, Dr. Wells is not happy, Caitlin is not happy, and she spends the morning cleaning Cisco’s lab at normal speed before watching them do their day jobs and then Caitlin and Cisco running point at the computer.

“Do you wanna come?”

Everything at STAR Labs was polite and friendly and she stays back to watch Barry work- he basically ran around town and waited for the police scanner to come back with something he could do- a fire, a cat stuck in a tree, anything really.

Which is probably when the men with guns decided to breach STAR Labs.

“This place is super- not- cute.” The redhead leading the bunch chuckles, “My boss wants to see you. All three of you.”

Wells moves forward but she laughs again, “No, not you. The Super One and The Young Geniuses.”

“Does this happen a lot?”

“Nope.” Caitlin sighs before picking up her tablet and purse before heading towards the armed men.

“Shouldn’t we be fighting them off?” Kara counts twelve heartbeats. She could disarm most of them and then maybe get a few more before they started shooting. Cisco has the same defeated look on his face.

“That’s Cupid. That means Amanda Waller finally thinks were important enough to have a meeting. Caitlin, wait I need to get my schematics!”

Cupid, whoever that is, is not happy to have her identity so easily outed.

“I told Waller that blonde was tricky.” Cupid frowned, “Carrie Cutler. The Arrow and I used to be a thing.”

The chorus of “No” negated that fact.

If she were to picture a top secret government facility (and having some experience with one) she would picture a non-descript gray building with a few cars outside and a bored looking secretary. Not a huge office building with an underground bunker.

It’s rare that Amanda Waller does anything personally anymore, but a woman Cisco describes as, “Diggle’s Wife” greets them off the elevator and escorts them to her office. If the forty agents sitting at cubicles were any indication ARGUS was much bigger and more organized than the DOE.

“How is Sara?” Caitlin smiles, hugging the other woman.

“She’s Daddy’s Little Princess. I plan on letting her roll around in the mud and then blaming John for it the next time it rains. Or maybe a puppy. Lyla Diggle.”

The handshake is firm but before they can chat they are at Waller’s office. Lyla does not come in with them.

**

“And then Waller was all like, ‘Mr. Ramon, your designs are being implemented by the U.S. Government’- the words every inventor fears the most, and then she cut me a HUGE check and a really scary contract and-”

Looking through the wall she could see Cisco avidly talking to Oliver over video chat, before talking about new arrows he’d designed over the past few weeks.

Oliver laughed. “That would never work. Why would I want a boxing glove arrow? I need the smallest possible quiver. Besides I’ve done that trick already and it was awesome.”

Cisco stops his talking in circles to look at the camera, “Does this mean you’re going to get back out there? I’m not saying full-on vigilante and I know you have reasons for not- being the Arrow. And I know that being Felicity’s Head of Security is important. She is a national treasure. But if the whole Kara situation is any indicator, the world needs The Arrow. Green or otherwise. ”

Oliver says something about Barry singlehandedly taking out the entire League of Assassins.

Cisco laughs, “We need to organize for- events like Aliens or super soldiers. Or catastrophic, timeline ruining events.  Now hear me out- The Justice League.”

She and Oliver say, “That’s a horrible name.” at the same time.

She might be eavesdropping three rooms away while Caitlin and Barry talk about some of the bad guys they’ve faced, but even then she knows the name will stick. Cisco comes back into the room and motions for Barry to go in next-

Kara realizes she’s made new friends for life.

Three months later when the Green Arrow arrives in Gotham with Superman, she tells Cat she can get an exclusive with the Emerald Archer. That they must be making some kind of superhero agreement, which meant that The Flash and Supergirl were bound to show up.

“I love to fly remember?”

Cat looks up at the framed magazine cover above her desk: Felicity making heart eyes at Oliver with the little placard that says “An Exclusive by Kara Danvers- 1 Million Copies Sold”.  She hesitates, but the spattering of articles and interviews with Supergirl with her byline on them (plus her mug shot of going to jail for not revealing her source) and gives her the corporate card to buy tickets.

“First flight out of National to Gotham. No layovers. If Superman’s on this Lois Lane will probably catching a ride with him. And if you go toe to toe with her, be ready. I speak from experience she’s not afraid to play dirty.”

Kara tries to run for the bag already packed underneath her desk at a human speed. She’s pretty sure she failed. And that was okay with her.

THE END.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Supergirl, Green Arrow or The Flash and make no profit from this work of fiction.  
> Also I am looking for a beta please message me if you're interested.


End file.
